To Hold in the Heart & Live from the Archives!

Pang Yang Her, a student at the University of Wisconsin/Milwaukee got in touch with us in the Archives about footage from the Watson Kintner collections, Thailand/Laos 1957.

She is in the midst of cutting what is becoming a beautiful short film, narratives of Hmong women and their escape from their home country toward the U.S. Her mother is one of the three ladies who tell of hardships and toughness getting from one side to the other.

From the filmmaker: I never knew that reaching out to a museum for rights of footage would lead me to having the chance to share the story I grew up hearing outside of Wisconsin. It makes me really excited and thankful for all of the help I’ve been given. I hope people will feel the same courage and bravery that I feel when I listen to these stories of the Hmong women.

We hope to show this affecting film, tentatively titled To Hold in the Heart, in our Live from the Archives! occasional series.